And when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising of the child, his name was called JESUS, which was so named of the angel before he was conceived in the womb. (Luke 2:21)

Our Gospel for the day offers a completion of the Nativity story of Our Lord. In it, we see the first earthly heralds of Jesus' birth, the shepherds, paying homage to our Lord. Luke tells us that after they had received word from the "angel of the Lord", the whole sky was filled with the Glory of God and "a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying, Glory to God in the highest, and peace, good will to men." Imagine the stillness of the Judean pastureland, far out in the countryside, totally dark and quiet, suddenly exploding with the glory of God. It must have been a scene beyond description. Luke then tells us that the shepherds "made known abroad the saying which was told them concerning the child", thus fulfilling their role as the first earthly heralds of Christ. In verse. 21, in almost an oblique fashion, Luke mentions that "when eight days were accomplished for the circumcising of the child, his name was called JESUS, which was so named of the angel before he was conceived in the womb." Although it doesn't receive much emphasis from the gospel writer, being mentioned in passing, the circumcision of Christ is a very important event for we modern-day Christians for several reasons.

If we were to speak of this event in literary terms, we would say that it foreshadows the occurrence of Jesus' baptism, where he comes to John the Baptizer. John is incredulous when Jesus comes to him and says, in Mat 3:14: "But John forbad him, saying, "I have need to be baptized of thee, and comest thou to me?" Jesus' answer is instructive, when he says in Matt 3:15: "Suffer it to be so now: for thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness." Thus, it shows Jesus submitting to the ordinances of men and fulfilling all righteousness. Why would Christ do this and why is it significant to us?

We as orthodox Anglicans accept the doctrine of Christ as both perfect man and perfect God. We also accept the premise that Christ, through his perfect identification with our humanity, was able to redeem and glorify us. His complete identification with mankind, however, required that he fully submitted to the rites and ceremonies of his day. His complete submission translates into full identification with us, fallen mankind, whom he came to save.

One of the early Eastern fathers addressed the point that what Jesus did not assume, he could not glorify. If Jesus had been merely "God in a man suit", as the Nestorians thought, he never could have fully identified with our humanity. The Nestorians, who were an early heretical group, thought that God dwelt in Jesus as "a man might dwell in a house." They denied the dual-nature doctrine of Christ. If this were so, it would have a disastrous effect on our theology and our salvation, which is why the early Church fathers fought this concept so fiercely.

Fortunately for us, Christ did assume our humanity, becoming fully human: thus he was able to accomplish both our redemption and our glorification. Our redemption was won on the Cross, our glorification occurred when He took His (and our) resurrected humanity to heaven in the Ascension.

This is plainly stated in those wonderful and hopeful words of St. Paul in 1 Cor. 15:20-22: "But now is Christ risen from the dead, and become the firstfruits of them that slept. For since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive."

The reason all of this has meaning to us today has to do with the concept of covenant and covenantal signs. Even though, as our Rector mentioned to me yesterday, many churches have moved away from covenantal theology, replacing it with a host of other, less substantive approaches to God, the whole concept of covenant is absolutely vital to our lives as Christians, both individually and collectively. This is true for one most excellent reason: it is the way God has always related to His people.

We must only go to Genesis for examples of this. First, we had the Adamic Covenant, which involves Adam's abstention from the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which, of course, Eve and he broke. Then, we had the covenant with Noah, in which God promised to never again flood the earth. Its covenantal sign was the rainbow. Next, we had the Abrahamic Covenant, which is the one we are most concerned with today, because of it applications to Christ and the implications for Christian Baptism. In Gen 17:2, God tells Abram, soon to be named Abraham whose name means "father of many nations". "And I will make my covenant between me and thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly." God continues in Gen 17:6-7: "And I will make thee exceeding fruitful, and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall come out of thee. And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee."

The covenantal sign was that of male circumcision, as related in Gen. 17:10-12: "This is my covenant, which ye shall keep, between me and you and thy seed after thee; Every man child among you shall be circumcised. "And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin; and it shall be a token of the covenant betwixt me and you."

"And he that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you, every man child in your generations, he that is born in the house, or bought with money of any stranger, which is not of thy seed." To be part of the family of Israel, this was a necessary requirement, related to us in Gen 17:14: "And the uncircumcised man child whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he hath broken my covenant." Of course, it was understood that all females of the tribe were included under the covenant because of their relationship to the male. But if the male did not comply with this requirement, both he and his family group were excluded. For Christ to be considered a member of the covenantal family, in his humanity, his parents complied with the law. He was covered by the Old Covenant. Yet, as we saw in Mt. 3:15, Christ also complied with John's baptism as well. Why? After all, it must be clearly understood that John's baptism was not Christian baptism. Matthew tells us about his baptism in Mat 3:5-6 "Then went out to him Jerusalem, and all Judaea, and all the region round about Jordan, And were baptized of him in Jordan, confessing their sins." John's baptism was one of repentance, for he was foretelling the coming of the Kingdom of God. Thus, he would say in Matthew 3:2 "Repent ye: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand."

If John's baptism was one of repentance, why did Christ receive it? Christ had no need of repentance, being totally sinless. In short, Christ did not have to do this, but yet he did. The answers are three fold: 1) In the plain words of Scripture, Christ did it "to fulfill all righteousness"; 2) Christ complied with baptism of John, again to identify completely with sinful mankind, as if he had sin, which of course, he did not. 3) Christ, our great Role Model, himself modeled the behavior he would have us do.

Late in his ministry, after His Resurrection and just prior to His Ascension, Christ would command his disciples in Matthew 28:19 "Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost:"

How do we pull all of this together? That is, how do circumcision, Christian Baptism and covenant relate to each other? First, we know that circumcision is the sign and seal of the Old Covenant and that Baptism is the sign and seal of the New Covenant. We also have seen that Christ submitted to both of these rites. As usual in our Christian lives, Christ is the "key" to the puzzle of our lives. In this case, He "bridges" both the Old Testament and the New in Himself. It is the job that only Christ could fulfill, as the God-Man, Jesus Christ, provides eternal, infinite meditation between God and Man. He does not replace the Old Testament, but rather He fulfills it. Thus, when we preach Christ, we do not preach so-called "Replacement Theology", where the Old Testament is replaced with the New. This type of thinking very easily leads us down the path to Dispensationalism and to error. Rather, we preach "Fulfillment Theology', where Christ is the one, true, fulfillment and completion of all Old Testament prophecy. This is exactly why Christian Baptism is a fulfillment of the old sign of male circumcision, as it becomes the sign and seal of our membership in the "new" covenantal family of Jesus Christ. The glory of the New Testament is that God no longer requires the ritual shedding of blood from man, but rather the pouring of water in Baptism. God only requires the one, perfect and sufficient Sacrifice of Jesus Christ. He was the final Sacrifice, the Spotless Lamb of God offered for our sins. Thus, thanks be to God, no new blood need be shed, other than that which was done two thousand years ago at Calvary.

In our baptisms then, we pour the new and living Water of Christ. It washes away our original sin, as we say of the person being baptized: "Seeing then, dearly beloved brethren, that this child (or this person) is regenerate, and grafted into the body of Christ's church, let us give thanks unto Almighty God for these benefits;" We also recognize that Baptism changes our orientation in the sight of God. We are no longer like those St. Paul speaks of in Eph 2:12-13: "That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world:". Rather, "But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ." We are fit to receive the covenantal promises of the family of God.

In the next few minutes, we are, through the blessings of God, about to achieve "union and communion" with our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ through the wonderful mystery of the Holy Eucharist. In this most sublime act of worship and adoration, we will meet with our God in our minds, souls and bodies. Our little trinity thus will join with the Most Holy, Blessed and Eternal Trinity: Father, Son and Holy Ghost in a blessed communion of love and acceptance. While on this earth we will never fully comprehend the mystery, let us acknowledge and worship the One who makes it possible, Jesus Christ our Lord.

To Him be all honor and glory, now and forever, world without end. Amen.